You know Steve Mariucci from the NFL. But did you know he used to ski jump?
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Football fans know Steve Mariucci from his various roles in the game.
An analyst for the NFL Network, Mariucci was the head coach of the San Francisco 49ers and Detroit Lions after a stint as an assistant with the Green Bay Packers. Before that he coached in college.
Sports fans from Wisconsin and Michigan may recall hearing how Mariucci played sports alongside Tom Izzo – the men’s basketball coach at Michigan State since 1995 – when they were at Iron Mountain High School, near the Wisconsin border in Upper Michigan.
But who remembers Steve Mariucci the ski jumper?
“When I was a kid, Iron Mountain, the Kiwanis Ski Club, had a terrific kids’ program for ski jumping,” Mariucci said. “It was unbelievable. There was a hill that was lit up at night, and dads would bring their kids to learn how to ski jump. …
“That’s where beginners learned to jump. And I remember vividly a packed house at night.”
Steve Mariucci recalls the smaller ski jumps in his hometown
Since 1939 Iron Mountain has held high-level competitions at Pine Mountain, a 180-foot-tall slide with a landing hill similar to those used for the Olympics.
Novices, as Mariucci described, start on much smaller hills and can work their way up.
“There were three hills, the Miron (Ski Bowl), the Mighty Mite and the Mini Mite,” Mariucci said. “The Mini Mite was little; they’d go about 8 to 10 feet. It was for little, beginner, 3-, 4-year-old kids. And the Mighty Mite, you’d end up going 30, 40 feet. It was a wooden scaffold. The Miron was a bigger jump. You’d go about 70 to 100 feet, (that) would be a heck of a jump.
“What an unbelievable ski jump program. And it was all volunteers.”
There also was a smaller companion jump at Pine Mountain that was the next step.
Mariucci remains a supporter of the Pine Mountain jumps
Mariucci downhill skied with his friend Jim Altobelli, whose sister Therese became the first woman to jump on the big hill at Pine Mountain, in 1978. Mariucci also started jumping young.
Mariucci, 67, continues to be a supporter of the Kiwanis Ski Club and plans to return to his hometown to attend the Continental Cup meet March 4-5 at Pine Mountain, as he often does.
“I started jumping before I was really familiar with watching the ski tournaments at Pine Mountain,” Mariucci said. “If you were 8 years old and then you start going to Pine Mountain and watching these guys just in awe. The jumpers then just were superstars. And it was a spectacle, an unbelievable event.
“It was the Super Bowl. And it was great. Still is great.”
He knew it was time to stop jumping
Mariucci jumped into his early teens, progressing to the intermediate hill before he stopped.
“What I realized was I was kind of afraid of heights, man,” Mariucci said. “Every time I’d go up there, I was like, what am I doing up here?
“Then when I went to high school, Tom Izzo and I played for Gordy LeDuc and he absolutely would not let any of his basketball players ski. Ski or ski jump. And I thanked him because I just had enough. Because my next stop was up to Pine Mountain and I didn’t want to do it, man.”
From 2013:At request of Mariucci, Favre takes a step up
Mariucci has another fond childhood memory of the Pine Mountain tournament
These days, tickets are sold for a tennis ball drop at the end of the Pine Mountain competition, and the person whose tennis ball goes the farthest wins a prize.
But when Mariucci was young, the unofficial closing of the event was altogether different.
“The thing that we used to do when we were kids – and they don’t allow it now, thank goodness – is as soon as the last jumper on Sunday would finish … he’d go psheeewww and he’d land,” Mariucci said, “then about hundreds of kids would be up on the landing hill, along the sides, and then slide down on their butt or their boots or something, just to take a ride down that landing and get a thrill, you know?
“Crashing into each other down on the bottom. And then the announcer: ‘STAY OFF THE HILL! STAY OFF THE HILL!’ Well, it was like the crowd rushing the court after a basketball game.”
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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: NFL Network's Steve Mariucci ski jumped as a kid in Upper Michigan
